If they were vaxxed?
It seems like recently I’ve had a couple of people referring to memorial services and such for people who recently died from Covid. None of them have commented as to whether or not the deceased was vaxxed/boosted, and I’ve realized that s pretty much the first thing in my mind.
Just wondering if I am alone.
I guess you can miss a stupid person as much as a non-stupid one…
Depends who I’m asking. If it’s a close family member, no. But ‘no’, in the same way I wouldn’t ask a close family member of a car accident victim if they were wearing their seat belt.
If it’s someone a bit further out (extended family, friend etc), maybe. It would depend entirely on the circumstances. For starters, I’d have to be reasonably confident the person I’m asking feels the same way about the vaccines that I do (pro).
Having said that, if someone dies of covid, the odds are very, very much in your favor if you assume they’re not vaxxed.
Am I curious? Yes. Do I ask? Nope, I don’t trust myself not to react.
I’d hesitate to ask, but I’d certainly be wondering.
I would not ask both for reasons of privacy and sensitivity, and because it ultimately is not useful information. If you really want to know the efficacy of various levels of vaccination, read the published literature instead of relying on statistically insignificant anecdotes.
It’s not scientifically useful information, but it might be persuasively useful. If being asked the question, and reflecting upon the answer, persuades someone to get vaccinated, then that’s a good thing, even if it is prompted by ignorance.
Our next-door neighbor died of Covid, a few weeks ago, age 85. We’re very curious as to whether he was vaxxed, it was one of the 1st things we thought of, but we haven’t asked. He had no family, just a longtime caregiver who’s been coming in once or twice a week for 20+ years and was clearly grieving when we spoke to her. I went to the wake and funeral while my husband was at work; he wanted me to ask the caregiver but I couldn’t do it. He said to ask her if I see her (she’s been clearing the house) but we agreed that it’s too difficult to ask.
A young man I know often comes and does work around my place. He is a product of a fundamentalist churchy upbringing and a member of the military. He’d been heavily propagandized into an anti-vax position and used to poke light fun at me for my masks and vaccine history. Still, he’s bright and takes his news from the Beeb, so he hasn’t bought into the super bat shit stuff. We’ve had many interesting conversations. Yet he and his family remained staunchly anti-vax. He was prepared to leave the military over it.
About 6 months ago, he kind of went off the deep end and I didn’t really know the particulars, just that he wasn’t responding to messages or calls. He shared only that a family member had died and he was going through a lot. I had my suspicions but refrained from asking.
Recently he came back to do some work and we had a good chat. It was his father who had died. Of COVID. At age 62. I didn’t have to ask the vax question. But there was no way I was going to rub it in. There’s no easy way to lose your dad, ever. He volunteered he had been “humbled” by the experience and implied he and the family had gotten vaccinated as a result of this sad loss.
Had I not known, I probably would have asked – eventually. But not right away. And very gently.
You may be able to look online. In my jurisdiction, the cause of death is public information available on the Medical Examiner’s website. A friend of mine died about a month ago and I periodically check to see if they’ve listed the cause of death yet and I can see that there were 10 (reported) covid deaths the day she died.
FYI, it’s all semi-anonymous. There’s nothing technically identifiable on there. But you need very little info and a bit of time and you can put enough pieces together to find someone you’re looking for.
The problem with that is when the reports are not differentiating between dying from Covid and dying with Covid.
How much difference is there, really? I mean, if you happen to fall down the stairs and break your neck or something while having an asymptomatic Covid infection, then obviously the Covid was not the cause of or a crucial contributor to your death.
But if your Covid infection was a key factor in your susceptibility to whatever it was that actually killed you, then it’s meaningful to say that you died due to Covid, and misleading to say that you merely died “with” Covid.
AFAICT, the latter type of case vastly outnumbers the former among reported Covid deaths.
True. I went back and looked and they have spots for multiple causes (and/or contributing causes). I don’t know if there’s a way to tell the difference between ‘died with’ and ‘died from’. They all have “Complications of infection with novel Coronavirus (COVID-19)” listed as “Cause A” and something else (ie obesity or COPD or Diabetes) as Cause B or Other Cause (if there’s something else to list).
I couldn’t tell you what that means though.
I did also notice that, at least on some, they listed their vaccination dates (but don’t know if the ones without vaccines listed were unvaxxed, unknown vax status or something else).
So, it’s true, you can’t tell but if you see Covid listed as “Cause A” with Cause B or Other Cause something like [real examples] “Congestive heart failure, atherosclerotic coronary vascular disease, atrial fibrillation, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, vaccinated (Pfizer 5-5 & 6-3-21)” or “Cardiomyopathy, hypertension, peripheral vascular disease, diabetes mellitus, chronic renal failure”.
I feel like it’s safe to say that, at the very least, Covid was part of it. Maybe it wasn’t. Maybe it’s only why they died today and not next month.
There have been reports in the media that some state? federal? agency was including deaths from gunshots and automobile crashes in the category of Covid deaths, because the victims tested positive.
Feel free to cite any such reports. While such deaths among Covid patients are certainly part of the overall Covid case statistics, AFAICT they unambiguously do not count as “deaths from Covid” according to official WHO or US policy.
I’ll go even further: would you (also) ask what kind of precautions they were taking? If they went out to eat regularly? If they’d attended large events? If they’d worn masks?
It says right there in your cite how the recordkeeping makes the distinction between “from” and “with”:
Also, given that your cite is from December 2020, I’m not sure it’s applicable to the way Covid statistics are currently handled.
Moderating:
None of this discussion relating to how COVID deaths are classified by particular states has anything to do with the question posed by the OP. Let’s drop this hijack immediately. Thanks.
No Warnings issued.
I was more curious about those things before the vaccine was available. Now I’m less likely to judge people for taking those kinds of risks if they were vaccinated. And if they weren’t vaccinated, I judge them more harshly for that than for other risky choices.
Nevermind, covered already.